26

THE LAIRD’S RETURN

At first, we were so happy only to be with each other and away from Leoch than we didn’t talk much. Across the flat of the moor, Donas could carry us both without strain, and I rode with my arms about Jamie’s waist, glorying in the feel of the sun-warmed muscle shifting under my cheek. Whatever problems we might be facing—and I knew there were plenty—we were together. Forever. And that was enough.

As the first shock of happiness mellowed into the glow of companionship, we began to talk again. About the countryside through which we were passing, at first. Then, cautiously, about me, and where I had come from. He was fascinated by my descriptions of modern life, though I could tell that most of my stories seemed like fairy tales to him. He loved especially the descriptions of automobiles, tanks, and airplanes, and made me describe them over and over, as minutely as I could. By tacit agreement, we avoided any mention of Frank.

As we covered more countryside, the conversation turned back to our present time; Colum, the Castle, then the stag hunt and the Duke.

“He seems a nice chap,” Jamie remarked. As the going became rougher, he had dismounted and walked alongside, which made conversation easier.

“I thought so too,” I answered. “But—”

“Oh, aye, ye canna put too much faith in what a man seems these days,” he agreed. “Still, we got on, he and I. We’d sit together and talk of an evening, found the fire in the hunting lodge. He’s a good bit brighter than he seems, for the one thing; he knows how that voice makes him seem, and I think he uses it to make himself look a bit of a fool, while all the time the mind is there, workin’ behind his eyes.”

“Mmm. That’s what I’m afraid of. Did you … tell him?”

He shrugged. “A bit. He knew my name, of course, from that time before, at the castle.”

I laughed at the memory of his account of that time. “Did you, er, reminisce about old times?”

He grinned, the ends of his hair floating about his face in the autumn breeze.

“Oh, just a bit. He asked me once whether I still suffered from stomach trouble. I kept my face straight and answered that as a rule, no, but I thought perhaps I felt a bit of griping coming on just now. He laughed, and said he hoped it did not discommode my beautiful wife.”

I laughed myself. Right now, what the Duke might or mightn’t do didn’t seem of overwhelming importance. Nevertheless, he might one day be of use.

“I told him a little,” Jamie went on. “That I was outlawed, but not guilty of the charge, though I’d have precious little chance of proving it. He seemed sympathetic, but I was cautious about telling him the circumstances—let alone the fact that there’s a price on my head. I hadna yet made up my mind whether to trust him with the rest of it, when … well, when Old Alec came tearing into the camp like the devil himself was on his tail, and Murtagh and I left the same way.”

This reminded me. “Where is Murtagh?” I asked. “He came back with you to Leoch?” I hoped the little clansman hadn’t fallen afoul of either Colum or the villagers of Cranesmuir.

“He started back wi’ me, but the beast he was riding was no match for Donas. Aye, a bonny wee lad ye are, Donas mo buidheag.” He slapped the shimmering sorrel neck, and Donas snorted and ruffled his mane. Jamie glanced up at me and smiled.

“Dinna worry for Murtagh. There’s a canty wee bird can mind for himself.”

“Canty? Murtagh?” I knew the word meant “cheerful,” which seemed incongruous to a degree. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile. Have you?”

“Oh, aye. At least twice.”

“How long have you known him?”

“Twenty-three years. He’s my godfather.”

“Oh. Well, that explains a bit. I didn’t think he’d bother on my account.”

Jamie patted my leg. “Of course he would. He likes you.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

Having thus approached the subject of recent events, I took a deep breath and asked something I badly wanted to know.

“Jamie?”

“Aye?”

“Geillis Duncan. Will they … will they really burn her?”

He glanced up at me, frowning slightly, and nodded.

“I expect so. Not ’til after the child is born, though. Is that what troubles ye?”

“One of the things. Jamie, look at this.” I tried to push up the voluminous sleeve, failed, and settled for pulling the neck of the shirt off my shoulder to display my vaccination scar.

“God in heaven,” he said slowly, after I had explained. He looked sharply at me. “So that’s why … is she from your own time then?”

I shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. All I can say is that she was likely born sometime after 1920; that’s when public inoculation came in.” I looked over my shoulder, but low-lying clouds hid the crags that now separated us from Leoch. “I don’t suppose I ever will know … now.”

Jamie took Donas’s reins and led him aside, under a small pine grove, on the banks of a small stream. He grasped me around the waist and lifted me down.

“Dinna grieve for her,” he said firmly, holding me. “She’s a wicked woman; a murderer, if not a witch. She did kill her husband, no?”

“Yes,” I said, with a shudder, remembering Arthur Duncan’s glazed eyes.

“I still dinna understand why she should kill him, though,” he said, shaking his head in puzzlement. “He had money, a good position. And I doubt he beat her.”

I looked at him in exasperated amazement.

“And that’s your definition of a good husband?”

“Well … yes,” he said, frowning. “What else might she want?”

“What else?” I was so taken aback, I just looked at him for a moment, then slid down on the grass and started to laugh.

“What’s funny? I thought this was murder.” He smiled, though, and put an arm around me.

“I was just thinking,” I said, still snorting a bit, “if your definition of a good husband is one with money and position who doesn’t beat his wife … what does that make you?”

“Oh,” he said. He grinned. “Well, Sassenach, I never said I was a good husband. Neither did you. ‘Sadist,’ I think ye called me, and a few other things that I wouldna repeat for the sake of decency. But not a good husband.”

“Good. Then I won’t feel obliged to poison you with cyanide.”

“Cyanide?” He looked down curiously at me. “What’s that?”

“The thing that killed Arthur Duncan. It’s a bloody fast, powerful poison. Fairly common in my time, but not here.” I licked my lips meditatively.

“I tasted it on his lips, and just that tiny bit was enough to make my whole face go numb. It acts almost instantly, as you saw. I should have known then—about Geilie, I mean. I imagine she made it from crushed peach pits or cherry stones, though it must have been the devil of a job.”

“Did she tell ye why she did it, then?”

I sighed and rubbed my feet. My shoes had been lost in the struggle at the loch, and I tended to pick up stickers and cockleburs, my feet not being hardened as Jamie’s were.

“That and a good deal more. If there’s anything to eat in your saddlebags, why don’t you fetch it, and I’ll tell you all about it.”

---

We entered the valley of Broch Tuarach the next day. As we came down out of the foothills, I spotted a solitary rider, some distance away, heading roughly in our direction. He was the first person I had seen since we had left Cranesmuir.

The man approaching us was stout and prosperous-looking, with a snowy stock showing at the neck of a serviceable grey serge coat, its long tails covering all but an inch or two of his breeches.

We had been traveling for the best part of a week, sleeping out-of-doors, washing in the cold, fresh water of the burns, and living quite well off such rabbits and fish as Jamie could catch, and such edible plants and berries as I could find. Between our efforts, our diet was better than that in the Castle, fresher, and certainly more varied, if a little unpredictable.

But if nutrition was well served by an outdoor life, appearance was another thing, and I took hasty stock of our looks as the gentleman on horseback hesitated, frowning, then changed direction and trotted slowly toward us to investigate.

Jamie, who had insisted on walking most of the way to spare the horse, was a disreputable sight indeed, hose stained to the knees with reddish dust, spare shirt torn by brambles and a week’s growth of beard bristling fiercely from cheek and jaw.

His hair had grown long enough in the last months to reach his shoulders. Usually clubbed into a queue or laced back, it was free now, thick and unruly, with small bits of leaf and stick caught in the disordered coppery locks. Face burned a deep ruddy bronze, boots cracked from walking, dirk and sword thrust through his belt, he looked a wild Highlander indeed.

I was hardly better. Covered modestly enough in the billows of Jamie’s best shirt and the remnants of my shirt, barefoot, and shawled in his plaid, I looked a right ragamuffin. Encouraged by the misty dampness and lacking any restraint in the form of comb or brush, my hair rioted all over my head. It had grown as well during my sojourn at the Castle, and floated in clouds and tangles about my shoulders, drifting into my eyes whenever the wind was behind us, as it was now.

Shoving the wayward locks out of my eyes, I watched the cautious approach of the gentleman in grey. Jamie, seeing him, brought our own horse to a stop and waited for him to draw near enough for speech.

“It’s Jock Graham,” he said to me, “from up the way at Murch Nardagh.”

The man came within a few yards, reined up and sat looking us over carefully. His eyes, pouched with fat, crinkled and rested suspiciously on Jamie, then suddenly sprang wide.

“Lallybroch?” he said unbelievingly.

Jamie nodded benignly. With a completely unfounded air of proprietorial pride, he laid a hand on my thigh and said, “and my lady Lallybroch.”

Jock Graham’s mouth dropped an inch or two, then was hastily drawn up again into an expression of flustered respect.

“Ah … my … lady,” he said, belatedly doffing his hat and bowing in my direction. “You’ll be, er, going home, then?” he asked, trying to keep his fascinated gaze from resting on my leg, bared to the knee by a rent in my shift, and stained with elderberry juice.

“Aye.” Jamie glanced over his shoulder, toward the rift in the hill he had told me was the entrance to Broch Tuarach. “You’ll have been there lately, Jock?”

Graham pulled his eyes away from me and looked at Jamie. “Och? Oh, aye. Aye, I’ve been there. They’re all well. Be pleased to see ye, I expect. Go well, then, Fraser.” And with a hasty dig into his horse’s ribs, he turned aside and headed up the valley.

We watched him go. Suddenly, a hundred yards away, he paused. Turning in the saddle, he rose in his stirrups and cupped his mouth to shout. The sound, borne by the wind, reached us thin but distinct.

“Welcome home!”

And he disappeared over a rise.

---

Broch Tuarach means “the north-facing tower.” From the side of the mountain above, the broch that gave the small estate its name was no more than another mound of rocks, much like those that lay at the foot of the hills we had been traveling through.

We came down through a narrow, rocky gap between two crags, leading the horse between boulders. Then the going was easier, the land sloping more gently down through the fields and scattered cottages, until at last we struck a small winding road that led to the house.

It was larger than I had expected; a handsome three-story manor of harled white stone, windows outlined in the natural grey stone, a high slate roof with multiple chimneys, and several smaller whitewashed buildings clustered about it, like chicks about a hen. The old stone broch, situated on a small rise to the rear of the house, rose sixty feet above the ground, cone-topped like a witch’s hat, girdled with three rows of tiny arrow-slits.

As we drew near, there was a sudden terrible racket from the direction of the outbuildings, and Donas shied and reared. No horseman, I promptly fell off, landing ignominiously in the dusty road. With an eye for the relative importance of things, Jamie leapt for the plunging horse’s bridle, leaving me to fend for myself.

The dogs were almost upon me, baying and growling, by the time I found my feet. To my panicked eyes, there seemed to be at least a dozen of them, all with teeth bared and wicked. There was a shout from Jamie.

“Bran! Luke! Sheas!”

The dogs skidded to a halt within a few feet of me, confused. They milled, growling uncertainly, until he spoke again.

“Sheas, mo maise! Stand, ye wee heathen!” They did, and the largest dog’s tail began gradually to wag, once, and then twice, questioningly.

“Claire. Come take the horse. He’ll not let them close, and it’s me they want. Walk slowly; they’ll no harm ye.” He spoke casually, not to alarm either horse or dogs further. I was not so sanguine, but edged carefully toward him. Donas jerked his head and rolled his eyes as I took the bridle, but I was in no mood to put up with tantrums, and I yanked the rein firmly down and grabbed the headstall.

The thick velvet lips writhed back from his teeth, but I jerked harder. I put my face close to the big glaring golden eye and glared back.

“Don’t try it!” I warned, “or you’ll end up as dogsmeat, and I won’t lift a hand to save you!”

Jamie meanwhile was slowly walking toward the dogs, one hand held out fistlike toward them. What had seemed a large pack was only four dogs: a small brownish rat-terrier, two ruffed and spotted shepherds, and a huge black and tan monster that could have stood in for the Hound of the Baskervilles with no questions asked.

This slavering creature stretched out a neck thicker than my waist and sniffed gently at the proffered knuckles. A tail like a ship’s cable beat back and forth with increasing fervor. Then it flung back its enormous head, baying with joy, and leaped on its master, knocking him flat in the road.

“ ‘In which Odysseus returns from the Trojan War and is recognized by his faithful hound,’ ” I remarked to Donas, who snorted briefly, giving his opinion either of Homer, or of the undignified display of emotion going on in the roadway.

Jamie, laughing, was ruffling the fur and pulling the ears of the dogs, who were all trying to lick his face at once. Finally he beat them back sufficiently to rise, keeping his feet with difficulty against their ecstatic demonstrations.

“Well, someone’s glad to see me, at any rate,” he said, grinning, as he patted the beast’s head. “That’s Luke—” he pointed to the terrier, “and Elphin and Mars. Brothers, they are, and bonny sheep-dogs. And this,” he laid an affectionate hand on the enormous black head, which slobbered in appreciation, “is Bran.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” I said, cautiously extending a knuckle to be sniffed. “What is he?”

“A staghound.” He scratched the pricked ears, quoting

            “Thus Fingal chose his hounds:

            Eye like sloe, ear like leaf,

            Chest like horse, hough like sickle

            And the tail joint far from the head.”

“If those are the qualifications, then you’re right,” I said, inspecting Bran. “If his tail joint were any further from his head, you could ride him.”

“I used to, when I was small—not Bran, I don’t mean, but his grandfather, Nairn.”

He gave the hound a final pat and straightened, gazing toward the house. He took the restive Donas’s bridle and turned him downhill.

“In which Odysseus returns to his home, disguised as a beggar,…” he quoted in Greek, having picked up my earlier remark. “And now,” he said, straightening his collar with some grimness, “I suppose it’s time to go and deal with Penelope and her suitors.”

When we reached the double doors, the dogs panting at our heels, Jamie hesitated.

“Should we knock?” I asked, a bit nervous. He looked at me in astonishment.

“It’s my home,” he said, and pushed the door open.

He led me through the house, ignoring the few startled servants we passed, past the entrance hall and through a small gun room, into the drawing room. It boasted a wide hearth with a polished mantel, and bits of silver and glass gleamed here and there, capturing the late-afternoon sun. For a moment, I thought the room was empty. Then I saw a faint movement in one corner near the hearth.

She was smaller than I had expected. With a brother like Jamie, I had imagined her at least my height, or even taller, but the woman by the fire barely reached five feet. Her back was to us as she reached for something on the shelf of the china cabinet, and the ends of her dress sash dipped close to the floor.

Jamie froze when he saw her.

“Jenny,” he said.

The woman turned and I caught an impression of brows black as ink-squills, and blue eyes wide in a white face before she launched herself at her brother.

“Jamie!” Small as she was, she jarred him with the impact of her embrace. His arms went about her shoulders in reflex and they clung for a moment, her face tight against his shirtfront, his hand tender on the nape of her neck. On his face was an expression of such mingled uncertainty and yearning joy that I felt almost an intruder.

Then she pressed herself closer to him, murmuring something in Gaelic, and his expression dissolved in shock. He grasped her by the arms and held her away from him, looking down.

The faces were much alike; the same oddly slanted dark blue eyes and broad cheekbones. The same thin, blade-bridged nose, just a trifle too long. But she was dark where Jamie was fair, with cascades of black curly hair, bound back with green ribbon.

She was beautiful, with clear-drawn features and alabaster skin. She was also clearly in a state of advanced pregnancy.

Jamie had gone white at the lips. “Jenny,” he whispered, shaking his head. “Oh, Jenny. Mo cridh.”

Her attention was distracted just then by the appearance of a small child in the doorway, and she pulled away from her brother without noticing his discomposure. She took the little boy’s hand and led him into the room, murmuring encouragement. He hung back a little, thumb in mouth for comfort, peering up at the strangers from behind his mother’s skirts.

For his mother she plainly was. He had her mop of thick, curly black hair and the square set of her shoulders, though the face was not hers.

“This is wee Jamie,” she said, looking proudly down at the lad. “And this is your uncle Jamie, mo cridh, the one you’re named for.”

“For me? You named him for me?” Jamie looked like a fighter who has just been punched very hard in the stomach. He backed away from mother and child until he blundered into a chair, and sank into it as though the strength had gone from his legs. He hid his face in his hands.

His sister by this time was aware that something was amiss. She touched him tentatively on the shoulder.

“Jamie? What is it, my dearie? Are ye ill?”

He looked up at her then, and I could see his eyes were full of tears.

“Did ye have to do that, Jenny? Do ye think that I’ve not suffered enough for what happened—for what I let happen—that ye must name Randall’s bastard for me, to be a reproach to me so long as I live?”

Jenny’s face, normally pale, lost all vestiges of color.

“Randall’s bastard?” she said blankly. “John Randall, ye mean? The Redcoat captain?”

“Aye, the Redcoat captain. Who else would I mean, for God’s sake! You’ll remember him, I suppose?” Jamie was recovering enough of his customary poise for sarcasm.

Jenny eyed her brother closely, one arched brow lifted in suspicion.

“Have ye lost your senses, man?” she inquired. “Or have ye taken a drop too much along the way?”

“I should never have come back,” he muttered. He rose then, stumbling slightly and tried to pass without touching her. She stood her ground, however, and gripped him by the arm.

“Correct me, brother, if I’m wrong,” Jenny said slowly, “but I’ve the strong impression you’re saying I’ve played the whore to Captain Randall, and what I’m askin’ myself is what maggots you’ve got in your brain to make ye say so?”

“Maggots, is it?” Jamie turned to her, mouth twisted with bitterness. “I wish it were so; I’d rather I was dead and in my grave than to see my sister brought to such a pass.” He seized her by the shoulders, and shook her slightly, crying out, “Why, Jenny, why? To have ye ruin yourself for me was shame enough to kill me. But this …” He dropped his hands then, with a gesture of despair that took in the protruding belly, swelling accusingly under the light smocking.

He turned abruptly toward the door, and an elderly woman, who had been listening avidly with the child clinging to her skirts, drew back in alarm.

“I should not have come. I’ll go.”

“You’ll do no such thing, Jamie Fraser,” his sister said sharply. “Not before you’ve listened to me. Sit yourself down, then, and I’ll tell ye about Captain Randall, since ye want to know.”

“I don’t want to know! I don’t want to hear it!” As she advanced toward him, he turned sharply away to the window that looked out over the yard. She followed him, saying “Jamie …,” but he repelled her with a violent gesture.

“No! Don’t talk to me! I’ve said I canna bear to hear it!”

“Och, is that a fact?” She eyed her brother, standing at the window with his legs braced wide apart, hands on the sill and back stubbornly set against her. She bit her lip and a calculating look came over her face. Quick as lightning, she stooped and her hand shot under his kilt like a striking snake.

Jamie let out a roar of sheer outrage and stood bolt upright with shock. He tried to turn, then froze as she apparently tightened her grip.

“There’s men as are sensible,” she said to me, with a wicked smile, “and beasts as are biddable. Others ye’ll do nothing with, unless ye have ’em by the ballocks. Now, ye can listen to me in a civil way,” she said to her brother, “or I can twist a bit. Hey?”

He stood still, red-faced, breathing heavily through clenched teeth. “I’ll listen,” he said, “and then I’ll wring your wee neck, Janet! Let me go!”

No sooner did she oblige than he whirled on her.

“What in hell d’ye think you’re doing?” he demanded. “Tryin’ to shame me before my own wife?” Jenny was not fazed by his outrage. She rocked back on her heels, viewing her brother and me sardonically.

“Weel, and if she’s your wife, I expect she’s more familiar wi’ your balls than what I am. I havena seen them myself since ye got old enough to wash alone. Grown a bit, no?”

Jamie’s face went through several alarming transformations, as the dictates of civilized behavior struggled with the primitive impulse of a younger brother to clout his sister over the head. Civilization at length won out, and he said through his teeth, with what dignity he could summon, “Leave my balls out of it. And then, since you’ll not rest ’til ye make me hear it, tell me about Randall. Tell me why ye disobeyed my orders and chose to dishonor yourself and your family instead.”

Jenny put her hands on her hips and drew herself to her full height, ready for combat. Slower than he to lose her temper; still she had one, no doubt of that.

“Oh, disobey your orders, is it? That’s what eats at ye, Jamie, isn’t it? You know best, and we’ll all do as ye say, or we’ll come to rack and ruin, nae doubt.” She flounced angrily. “And if I’d done as you said, that day, you’d ha’ been dead in the dooryard, Faither hanged or in prison for killing Randall, and the lands gone forfeit to the Crown. To say nothing of me, wi’ my home and family gone, needing to beg in the byroads to live.”

Not pale at all now, Jamie was flushed with anger.

“Aye, so ye chose to sell yourself rather than beg! I’d sooner have died in my blood and seen Faither and the lands in hell along with me, and well ye know it!”

“Aye, I know it! You’re a ninny, Jamie, and always have been!” his sister returned in exasperation.

“Fine thing for you to say! You’re not content wi’ ruining your good name and my own, ye must go on with the scandal, and flaunt your shame to the whole neighborhood!”

“You’ll not speak to me in that way, James Fraser, brother or no! What d’ye mean, ‘my shame’? Ye great fool, you—”

“What I mean? When you’re goin’ about swelled out to here like a mad toad?” He mimicked her belly with a contemptuous swipe of the hand.

She took one step back, drew back her hand and slapped him with all the force she could muster. The impact jarred his head back and left a white outline of her fingers printed on his cheek. He slowly raised a hand to the mark, staring at his sister. Her eyes were glittering dangerously and her bosom heaved. The words spilled out in a torrent between clenched white teeth.

“Toad, is it? Stinking coward—ye’ve no more courage than to leave me here, thinking ye dead or imprisoned, wi’ no word from one day to the next, and then ye come strolling in one fine day—with a wife, no less—and sit in my drawing room calling me toad and harlot and—”

“I didna call ye harlot, but I should! How can ye—”

Despite the differences in their heights, brother and sister were almost nose to nose, hissing at one another in an effort to keep their carrying voices from ringing through the old manor house. The effort was largely wasted, judging from the glimpses I caught of various interested faces peeping discreetly from kitchen, hall, and window. The laird of Broch Tuarach was having an interesting homecoming, to be sure.

I thought it best to let them have it out without my presence, and so I stepped quietly into the hall, with an awkward nod to the elderly woman, and continued into the yard. There was a small arbor there with a bench, on which I seated myself, looking about with interest.

Besides the arbor, there was a small walled garden, blooming with the last of the summer roses. Beyond it was what Jamie referred to as “the doocot”; or so I assumed, from the assorted pigeons that were fluttering in and out of the pierced-work opening at the top of the building.

I knew there was a barn and a shed for silage; these must be to the other side of the house, with the farm’s granary and the henyard, kailyard, and disused chapel. Which still left a small stone building on this side unaccounted for. The light autumn wind was from that direction; I sniffed deeply, and was rewarded with the rich smell of hops and yeast. That was the brewhouse, then, where the beer and ale for the estate were made.

The road past the gate led up and over a small hill. As I looked, a small group of men appeared at the crest, silhouetted in the evening light. They seemed to hover a moment, as though taking leave of each other. This appeared to be the case, for only one came down the hill toward the house, the others striking off through the fields toward a clump of cottages in the distance.

As the single man came down the hill, I could see that he limped badly. When he came through the gate, the reason for it was apparent. The right leg was missing below the knee, and he wore a wooden peg in replacement.

In spite of the limp, he moved youthfully. In fact, as he drew near to the arbor, I could see that he was only in his twenties. He was tall, nearly as tall as Jamie, but much narrower through the shoulder, thin, in fact, nearly to the point of skinniness.

He paused at the entrance to the arbor, leaning heavily on the lattice, and looked in at me with interest. Thick brown hair fell smoothly over a high brow, and deepset brown eyes held a look of patient good humor.

The voices of Jamie and his sister had risen while I waited outside. The windows were open to the warm weather, and the disputants were quite audible from the arbor, though not all the words were clear.

“Interfering, nosy bitch!” came Jamie’s voice, loud on the soft evening air.

“Havena the decency to …” His sister’s reply was lost in a sudden breeze.

The newcomer nodded easily toward the house.

“Ah, Jamie’s home, then.”

I nodded in reply, not sure whether I should introduce myself. It didn’t matter, for the young man smiled and inclined his head to me.

“I’m Ian Murray, Jenny’s husband. And I imagine ye’ll be … ah …”

“The Sassenach wench Jamie’s married,” I finished for him. “My name is Claire. Did you know about it, then?” I asked, as he laughed. My mind was racing. Jenny’s husband?

“Oh, aye. We heard from Joe Orr, who’d got it from a tinker in Ardraigh. Ye canna keep anything secret long in the Highlands. You should know that, even if you’ve been wed as little as a month. Jenny’s been wondering for weeks what you’d be like.”

“Whore!” Jamie bellowed from inside the house. Jenny’s husband didn’t turn a hair, but went on examining me with friendly curiosity.

“You’re a bonny lass,” he said, looking me over frankly. “Are ye fond of Jamie?”

“Well … yes. Yes, I am,” I answered, a bit taken aback. I was becoming accustomed to the directness that characterized most Highlanders, but it still took me unawares from time to time.

He pursed his lips and nodded as though satisfied, and sat down beside me on the bench.

“Better let them have a few minutes longer,” he said, with a wave at the house, where the shouting had now turned to Gaelic. He seemed completely unconcerned as to the cause of the battle. “Frasers dinna listen to anything when they’ve their danders up. When they’ve shouted themselves out, sometimes ye can make them see reason, but not ’til then.”

“Yes, I noticed,” I said dryly, and he laughed.

“So you’ve been wed long enough to find that out, eh? We heard as how Dougal made Jamie wed ye,” he said, ignoring the battle and concentrating his attention on me. “But Jenny said it would take more than Dougal MacKenzie to make Jamie do something he didna care to. Now that I see ye, of course I can see why he did it.” He lifted his brows, inviting further explanation, but politely not forcing it.

“I imagine he had his reasons,” I said, my attention divided between my companion and the house, where the sounds of combat continued. “I don’t want … I mean, I hope …” Ian correctly interpreted my hesitations and my glance toward the drawing-room windows.

“Oh, I expect you’ve something to do with it. But she’d take it out of him whether you were here or not. She loves Jamie something fierce, ye know, and she worried a lot while he was gone, especially with her father goin’ so sudden. Ye’ll know about that?” The brown eyes were sharp and observant, as though to gauge the depth of confidence between me and Jamie.

“Yes, Jamie told me.”

“Ah.” He nodded toward the house. “Then, of course, she’s wi’ child.”

“Yes, I noticed that too,” I said.

“Hard to miss, is it no?” Ian answered with a grin, and we both laughed. “Makes her frachetty,” he explained, “not that I’d blame her. But it would take a braver man than me to cross words wi’ a woman in her ninth month.” He leaned back, stretching his wooden leg out in front of him.

“Lost it at Daumier with Fergus nic Leodhas,” he explained. “Grape shot. Aches a wee bit toward the end of the day.” He rubbed the flesh just above the leather cuff that attached the peg to his stump.

“Have you tried rubbing it with Balm of Gilead?” I asked. “Water-pepper or stewed rue might help too.”

“I’ve not tried the water-pepper,” he answered, interested. “I’ll ask Jenny does she know how to make it.”

“Oh, I’d be glad to make it for you,” I said, liking him. I looked toward the house again. “If we stay long enough,” I added doubtfully. We chatted inconsequentially for a little, both listening with one ear to the confrontation going on beyond the window, until Ian hitched forward, carefully settling his artificial limb under him before rising.

“I imagine we should go in now. If either of them stops shouting long enough to hear the other, they’ll be hurting each other’s feelings.”

“I hope that’s all they hurt.”

Ian chuckled. “Oh, I dinna think Jamie would strike her. He’s used to forbearance in the face of provocation. As for Jenny, she might slap his face, but that’s all.”

“She already did that.”

“Weel, the guns are locked up, and all the knives are in the kitchen, except what Jamie’s wearing. And I don’t suppose he’ll let her close enough to get his dirk away from him. Nay, they’re safe enough.” He paused at the door. “Now, as for you and me …” He winked solemnly. “That’s a different matter.”

---

Inside, the maids started and flitted nervously away at Ian’s approach. The housekeeper, though, was still hovering by the drawing room door in fascination, drinking in the scene within, Jamie’s namesake cradled against her capacious bosom. Such was her concentration that when Ian spoke to her, she jumped as though he had run a hatpin into her, and put a hand to her palpitating heart.

Ian nodded politely to her, took the little boy in his arms, and led the way into the drawing room. We paused just inside the door to survey the scene. Brother and sister had paused for breath, both still bristling and glaring like a pair of angry cats.

Small Jamie, spotting his mother, struggled and kicked to get down from Ian’s arms, and once on the floor, made for her like a homing pigeon. “Mama!” he cried. “Up! Jamie up!” Turning, she scooped up the little boy and held him like a weapon against her shoulder.

“Can ye tell your uncle how old ye are, sweetheart?” she asked him, throttling her voice down to a coo—under which the sound of clashing steel was still all too apparent. The boy heard it; he turned and burrowed his face into his mother’s neck. She patted his back mechanically, still glaring at her brother.

“Since he’ll not tell ye, I will. He’s two, come last August. And if you’re bright enough to count—which I take leave to doubt—you’ll see he was conceived six months past the time I last saw yon Randall, which was in our own dooryard, beating the living daylight out of my brother with a saber.”

“That’s so, is it?” Jamie glowered at his sister. “I’ve heard a bit differently. It’s common knowledge you’ve taken the man to your bed; not the once, but as your lover. That child’s his.” He nodded contemptuously at his namesake, who had turned to peer under his mother’s chin at this big, loud stranger. “I believe ye when ye say the new bastard you’re carrying is not; Randall was in France ’til this March. So you’re not only a whore, but an unchoosy one too. Who fathered this last devil’s-spawn on ye?”

The tall young man beside me coughed apologetically, breaking the tension in the room.

“I did,” he said mildly. “That one too.” Advancing stiffly on his wooden leg, he took the little boy from his fuming wife and set him in the crook of his arm. “Favors me a bit, some say.”

In fact, seen side by side, the faces of man and boy were nearly identical, allowing for the round cheeks of the one and the crooked nose of the other. The same high brow and narrow lips. The same feathery brows arched over the same deep, liquid-brown eyes. Jamie, staring at the pair of them, looked rather as though he’d been hit in the small of the back with a sandbag. He closed his mouth and swallowed once, clearly having no idea what to do next.

“Ian,” he said, a little weakly. “You’re married, then?”

“Oh, aye,” his brother-in-law said cheerfully. “Wouldn’t do, otherwise, would it?”

“I see,” Jamie murmured. He cleared his throat and bobbed his head at his newly discovered brother-in-law. “It’s, er, it’s kind of ye, Ian. To take her, I mean. Most kind.”

Feeling that he might be in need of some moral support at this point, I moved to Jamie’s side, and touched his arm. His sister’s eyes lingered on me speculatively, but she said nothing. Jamie looked around and seemed startled to find me there, as though he had forgotten my existence. And no wonder if he had, I thought. But he seemed relieved by the interruption, at least, and put out a hand to draw me forward.

“My wife,” he said, rather abruptly. He nodded toward Jenny and Ian. “My sister, and, her, ah …” he trailed off, as Ian and I exchanged polite smiles.

Jenny was not to be distracted by social niceties.

“What d’ye mean, it’s kind of him to take me?” she demanded, ignoring the introductions. “As if I didna ken!” Ian looked inquiringly at her, and she waved a disdainful hand at Jamie. “He means it was kind of ye to wed me in my soiled condition!” She gave a snort that would have done credit to someone twice her size. “Bletherer!”

“Soiled condition?” Ian looked startled, and Jamie suddenly leaned forward and grasped his sister hard about the upper arm.

“Did ye not tell him about Randall?” He sounded truly shocked. “Jenny, how could ye do such a thing?”

Only Ian’s hand on Jenny’s other arm restrained her from flying at her brother’s throat. Ian drew her firmly behind him, and turning, set small Jamie in her arms, so that she was forced to grasp the child to save him falling. Then Ian put an arm about Jamie’s shoulders and tactfully steered him a safe distance away.

“It’s hardly a matter for the drawing room,” he said, low-voiced and deprecating, “but ye might be interested to know that your sister was virgin on her wedding night. I was, after all, in a position to say.”

Jenny’s wrath was now more or less evenly divided between brother and husband.

“How dare ye to say such things in my presence, Ian Murray!?” she flamed. “Or out of it, either! My wedding night’s no one’s business but mine and yours—sure it’s not his! Next you’ll be showing him the sheets from my bridal bed!”

“Weel, if I did now, it would shut him up, no?” said Ian soothingly. “Come now, mi dhu, ye shouldna worrit yourself, it’s bad for the babe. And the shouting troubles wee Jamie too.” He reached out for his son, who was whimpering, not sure yet whether the situation required tears. Ian jerked his head at me and rolled an eye in Jamie’s direction.

Taking my cue, I grabbed Jamie by the arm and dragged him to an armchair in a neutral corner. Ian had Jenny likewise installed on the loveseat, a firm arm across her shoulders to keep her in place.

“Now, then.” In spite of his unassuming manner, Ian Murray had an undeniable authority. I had my hand on Jamie’s shoulder, and could feel the tension begin to go out of it.

I thought that the room looked a bit like the ring of a boxing match, with the fighters twitching restlessly in the corners, each awaiting the signal for action under the soothing hand of a manager.

Ian nodded at his brother-in-law, smiling. “Jamie. It’s good to see ye, man. We’re pleased you’re home, and your wife with ye. Are we not, mi dhu?” he demanded of Jenny, his fingers tightening perceptibly on her shoulder.

She was not one to be forced into anything. Her lips compressed into a thin tight line, as though forming a seal, then opened reluctantly to let one word escape.

“Depends,” she said, and shut them tight again.

Jamie rubbed a hand over his face, then raised his head, ready for a fresh round.

“I saw ye go into the house with Randall,” he said stubbornly. “And from things he said to me later—how comes he to know you’ve a mole on your breast, then?”

She snorted violently. “Do ye remember all that went on that day, or did the Captain beat it out of ye wi’ his saber?”

“Of course I remember! I’m no likely to forget it!”

“Then perhaps you’ll remember that I gave the Captain a fair jolt in the crutch wi’ my knee at one point in the proceedings?”

Jamie hunched his shoulders, wary. “Aye, I remember.”

Jenny smiled in a superior manner.

“Weel then, if your wife here—ye could tell me her name at least, Jamie, I swear you’ve no manners at all—anyway, if she was to give ye similar treatment—and richly you deserve it, I might add—d’ye think you’d be able to perform your husbandly duties a few minutes later?”

Jamie, who had been opening his mouth to speak, suddenly shut it. He stared at his sister for a long moment, then one corner of his mouth twitched slightly.

“Depends,” he said. The mouth twitched again. He had been sitting hunched forward in his chair, but sat back now, looking at her with the half-skeptical expression of a younger brother listening to a sister’s fairy tales, feeling himself too old to be amazed, but half-believing still against his will.

“Really?” he said.

Jenny turned to Ian. “Go and fetch the sheets, Ian,” she ordered.

Jamie raised both hands in surrender. “No. No, I believe ye. It’s just, the way he acted after …”

Jenny sat back, relaxed in the curve of Ian’s arm, her son cuddling as close as the bulk of her belly would permit, gracious in victory.

“Weel, after all he’d said outside, he could hardly admit in front of his own men to being incapable, now could he? He’d have to seem as though he’d done as he promised, no? And,” she admitted, “I’ll have to say the man was verra unpleasant about it all; he did strike me and tear my gown. In fact, he knocked me half-senseless trying, and by the time I’d come to myself and got decently covered again, the English had gone, taking you along with them.”

Jamie gave a long sigh and closed his eyes briefly. His broad hands rested on his knees, and I covered one of them with a gentle squeeze. He took my hand and opened his eyes, giving me a faint smile of acknowledgment before turning back to his sister.

“All right,” he said. “But I want to know, Jenny; did ye know when ye went with him that he’d not harm you?”

She was silent for a moment, but her gaze was steady on her brother’s face, and at last she shook her head, a slight smile on her lips.

She put out a hand to stop Jamie’s protest, and the gull-winged brows rose in a graceful arc of inquiry. “And if your life is a suitable exchange for my honor, tell me why my honor is not a suitable exchange for your life?” The brows drew together in a scowl, the twin of the one adorning her brother’s face. “Or are you telling me that I may not love you as much as you love me? Because if ye are, Jamie Fraser, I’ll tell ye right now, it’s not true!”

Opening his mouth to reply before she was finished, Jamie was taken suddenly at a loss by this conclusion. He closed his mouth abruptly as his sister pressed her advantage.

“Because I do love ye, for all you’re a thick-headed, slack-witted, lack-brained gomerel. And I’ll no have ye dead in the road at my feet just because you’re too stubborn to keep your mouth shut for the once in your life!”

Blue eyes glared into blue eyes, shooting sparks in all directions. Swallowing the insults with difficulty, Jamie struggled for a rational reply. He seemed to be making up his mind to something. Finally he squared his shoulders, resigned to it.

“All right, then, I’m sorry,” he said. “I was wrong, and I’ll beg your pardon.”

He and his sister sat staring at each other for a long moment, but whatever pardon he was expecting from her was not forthcoming. She examined him closely, biting her lip, but said nothing. Finally he grew impatient.

“I’ve said I’m sorry! What more d’ye want of me?” he demanded. “Do ye want me to go on my knees to ye? I’ll do it if I must, but tell me!”

She shook her head slowly, lip still caught between her teeth.

“No,” she said at last, “I’ll not have ye on your knees in your own house. Stand up, though.”

Jamie stood, and she set the child down on the loveseat and crossed the room to stand in front of him.

“Take off your shirt,” she ordered.

“I’ll not!”

She jerked the shirttail out of his kilt and reached for the buttons. Short of forcible resistance, clearly he was going to obey or submit to being undressed. Retaining as much dignity as he could, he backed away from her, and tightlipped, removed the disputed garment.

She circled behind him and surveyed his back, her face displaying the same carefully blank expression I had seen Jamie adopt when concealing some strong emotion. She nodded, as though confirming something long suspected.

“Weel, and if you’ve been a fool, Jamie, it seems you’ve paid for it.” She laid her hand gently on his back, covering the worst of the scars.

“It looks as though it hurt.”

“It did.”

“Did you cry?”

His fists clenched involuntarily at his sides. “Yes!”

Jenny walked back around to face him, pointed chin lifted and slanted eyes wide and bright. “So did I,” she said softly. “Every day since they took ye away.”

The broad-cheeked faces were once more mirrors of each other, but the expression that they wore was such that I rose and stepped quietly through the kitchen door to leave them alone. As the door swung to behind me, I saw Jamie catch hold of his sister’s hands and say something huskily in Gaelic. She stepped into his embrace, and the rough bright head bent to the dark.